


Pastel Grey

by Scherbenreiter



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: AlternativeUniverse, Ascension, Demon!Magnus, Freshly-born-soul, M/M, slow-burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-13
Updated: 2017-02-13
Packaged: 2018-09-24 04:03:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9699695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scherbenreiter/pseuds/Scherbenreiter
Summary: >>We’ve all heard about fallen angels, be it literal or figurative. Tell the story of an ascended demon.<<It had all begun with a little, tiny itch in the back of his neck. One like those humans tended to get, right between their shoulder blades, where they can’t really reach without bending in the most impossible ways. One that, even if scratched, wouldn’t go away; most of the time, it was just there. In plain sight, and he would be able to ignore it. But sometimes, he would not.





	

### Chapter 1: Restraints

It had all begun with a little, tiny itch in the back of his neck. One like those humans tended to get, right between their shoulder blades, where they can’t really reach without bending in the most impossible ways. One that, even if scratched, wouldn’t go away; most of the time, it was just there. In plain sight, and he would be able to ignore it. But sometimes, he would not.

Today was one of those days. When he had woken from his stasis - something between slumber and death, a small, slippery brick, that every demon had to carefully balance upon whenever they had used too much energy, endured too much sun - it was there. In the center of his very mind. Keeping the thoughts that kept him stable, existent, in riot, making his body shift and turn in the most impossible ways.   
Not that he wasn’t used to it. Every demon turned and changed, on daily basis, most of them reducing themselves to piles of dirt, mud and grime over time, only managing to pull together in physical form when it was time to feed. He, born from the purest human sins, on the other hand, had evolved.  
Starting as a winged bestiality, body of a wolf, head of a lion, fur coated in the slick of the undead, had altered himself to this; to an almost human looking shape, blending in with the busy night, to bring glory to his name. The Great Destruction, they called him in hushed voices beneath shadows and dust. Slayer of so many souls that one would think him close to their master himself - close to Lucifer, the fallen angel. And no one would have spared a second thought on him agreeing, on him bathing in the glory of his own greed and pride. No one but himself.  
He, the demon lingering in the darkest shadow, waiting for his prey to arrive, repented this form. He repented being able to move impatient fingers, occupying himself so that he wouldn’t scratch the base of his fur coated neck. If he would still have been the beast he once was, he would have ripped the pesky piece of meat right from his body, stomping it to ashes while the wound would have close within a mind’s breath. And if it wouldn’t stop, he would have done it again and again and again, without a single moment of hesitation. Because that was what a demon did if the itch got too strong. That was what the Great Destruction should have done and he resented his inability to overcome the restraints that came with this physical form.   
Restraints, rooted in some odd residual that came with the hate, the fear, he consumed.  


Restraints that weren’t limited to this very basic mechanism of a demon’s existence. It had started with tiny, little humans, those that couldn’t really sate his hunger for fear, hurt and pain - he could and had excused his restraints like this, that they simply weren’t worth the effort anymore - and it had escalated quickly. To him, one of the great, old ones, being reduced to preying on vermin. To hiding in the shadows of an empty alley, right beneath the dumpster, when he should have roamed the city’s heart, searching for the hearts of humans so cold, so full of sin, that they would make good demons once he was finished with crushing their bones, with ripping them apart until only their hollow screams of agony were what was left-….  
He couldn’t. Not anymore. It was like his physical body stopped working, first only when he would pick up what was left of his prey to feed the minors, to help them grow, and now he wouldn’t even close his hand around the neck of an angry, hateful old man that lived right behind his dumpster. Easy prey, easier than the rat that was scanning the trash in front of him; one grab and it would be done.   
Yet his fingers wouldn’t. Yet the itch in his neck would grow to an incomprehensible force, to a single thought that would make him bow and leave and keep sustaining himself on whatever lived from the trash of his actual prey:   
No. So simple, so effective. No, don’t kill. No, don’t eat. No, don’t destroy.  
When he first had realized this one thought, the old One had been so confused. Confusion, that was something he, up to this point, had only known by the humans he had tended to first irritate a bit before actually killing them. Confusion, that was the thing that kept his naturally fragile existence on the brick of vanishing, like a naughty little child that could just not stop moving while he choked it’s life flame! His mind, his very existence, so much more powerful than others as old, could not grasp the meaning of this word No, of this thought that was part of everything he was made of - wasn’t it the contrary of what he basically was meant to be.   
He was meant to be destruction, yet he could not destroy. He was meant to kill, yet he couldn’t. He was meant to kill this stupid little rat that had come to him, that had joined him beneath his dumpster, that was basically walking over his itchy, itchy neck, agitating him. Making him pull himself together, solidifying in a sitting position next to the trash can. His hand tight around the squishy, warm body of a little, scared rat. How delicious the fear smelt, how much he craved filling himself with this tiny bit of what he needed so much. Just a little more pressure, just a little, tiny bit - and again. No. No. NO.  
The little animal fell to the floor, alive. Struggled, but got to it’s feet and vanished in the darkness of the alley. Struggled as much as the Old one himself while he clawed his blood-framed fingernails in the back of his head, agony welling up in the tender skin that had replaced his once thick fur. This had to stop, immediately. His existence, all with frayed ends, pits and pieces, was on the line; he -needed- to kill, he was the kill himself and if he wouldn’t, he would vanish…  
Desperation flooded what was the demon, making his fingertips shake in strain. Desperation cut into the fragile skin and diped them in the thick, black ichor that was his meat. Desperation made him pull and pull, his non existent voice mute while he copied the basic reaction of his prey to pain and riped his lips open in a scream of agony.  
He had never felt pain before.

It was morning. The sun was shy of rising above the roofs, light creeping up to the little alley. It had been hours of sitting there. Chunks of ichor clung to the wall where they had been thrown at, running down the red bricks like the goo little humans liked to play with. The wound had, like always, closed - actually, it had been closed for quite some time now, yet the demon would not move to find a shadow he could hide in until the sun set again. The experience of pain had shoken him to the core, had shoken every fibre of his existence. It wasn’t supposed to hurt. He wasn’t supposed to have restraints. He wasn’t supposed to….  
“Feel pain. Feel pity. Feel regret.”  
Cat eyes, the only thing left from the bestiality that once was the Great Destruction, turned to look up to the shape in front of him. He knew the shape. The greyish-brown cloth that hid an ancient body. The metal colored feathers that made wings, created to hunt for the likes of him in the night. An angel, no, a Cherub even. Arrived, so the demon thought, to claim his downfall.  
A raspy sound fell from his lips, something that could remind a listener of dried, dead leaves on soil. A broken voice, rocked in the pitiful excuse of a laugh. Still, the Cherub didn’t move. He didn’t pull his sword that was stripped to his back, nor did he reach out to raise the little mirror that hung around his neck, a perfect weapon to redirect sunlight to the demon’s face - to kill him with the heat he feared so much.  
“Only where there is the purest love can be the purest hate, Shadowchild.”  
The Angel went on and, finally, took a step closer to the Great one, squatting down so he could look right into the face of the creature he had once sworn to kill.  
“So in the purest hate, there always is a little love. A little humanity…. and we have never seen a demon old enough that he could absorb as much humanity in himself as needed… to ascend…”  
The old One flinched at those words. Demons were not meant to be… human. To feel like a human. That was what made him so weak, so unable to sustain himself with what he needed.  
**“Kill me.”**  
The dried leaves-voice muttered, pressing his nails into his bare arms that were too smooth, too weak for a demon. But the angel only laughed, gently, and reached out to touch the bit of raven hair that his fur left on top of his head.  
“No. We would only kill the raging beast we expected to meet in this little alley. But not a freshly born soul that has met the despair and pain that the beast has caused. Come with us. The shadows aren’t a place for you anymore.”  
The Great old didn’t understand, but how should he? His prey as well never understood what happened when he plucked them from their lives. And maybe this was a joke as cruel as the ones he used to play on earth’s children, when they thought themselves safe from his claws. So he nodded, defeated. Even if it was a joke and the Cherub would kill him in mere moments, it would be better to keep sitting in this alley, starving, afraid. So he nodded and the itching in the back of his neck, of the first time in hours, days, years, started receding.  
“Tell us a name we can call you by, shadowchild. A name worthy to be given to a soul.”  
**“Magnus.”**

**Author's Note:**

> First of all.... Hi! :D Thanks for reading this up-until-now One Shot, maybe-soonish Multi-chapter. It all started with a writing prompt on tumblr and, well, I pretty much took a figurative skinny dip in this; it's my first English fanfiction.... my first fanfiction at all that I post on this wonderful website. So I hope you enjoyed.  
> Furthermore, I have to apologize for mistakes in language, grammar or the like. I am not a native speaker :(’
> 
> Ideas, questions or suggestions are most welcome!  
> Please, do also tell me if I missed tags that I should add, as well as if the M-rating is okay or whether I should rate this fic R - because, seriously, I suck at rating.


End file.
